Why are we conducting this research? 
HR professionals and leaders in law firms seek to understand what other law firms are doing in order to shape their strategies, plans, systems, suppliers and policies. 
This research will focus on 2 key areas of interest:

1) Data & Analytics 
What data and metrics are being used to measure the success of HR initiatives and what reporting and insight is being used to drive decision-making?

2) Technology 
What tools, systems and suppliers are being used to support HR initiatives? 
People in Law, Veran Performance and MHR connect and converse with hundreds of law firms and are pleased to be able to bring structure to these conversations, share current practice and provide valuable commentary on our findings. 

Veran also offers independent, software agnostic advice and consulting to help businesses understand the data, analytics and technology choices in the market and their capabilities, strengths and weaknesses. Many businesses are not aware that this objective advice exists to support their selection and procurement of HR and Payroll tools.

This year’s events such as Covid-19 and Black Lives Matter have brought about disruption, new opportunities and changes in our priorities. Now therefore seems like a great time to share insights with peers and help the sector thrive in the post pandemic world.
Why participate?

Every firm who participates will receive a comprehensive report of the results, and an invitation to a private event to discuss the findings with peers and industry experts.

The report and event will explore what law firms are doing from a Strategy, Data & Analytics and Technology perspective in the following areas:
  • Recruitment
  • Composition of existing employees
  • Pay & reward
  • Retention & engagement
  • Managing attrition
  • Wellbeing
  • Training & development
As a further thank you for your time, we will give one lucky participant a free ticket to one of People in Law’s future events which we hope will be in person soon!

Your responses will be anonymised and aggregated so that findings are not linked back to specific firms.
Instructions for completing the survey

We appreciate that completing the survey may require you to ask colleagues for information so feel free to forward the survey where needed. You can also save your responses and finish it later.  

Please try to be specific about which technology providers you are using by including the names of the vendor and product where possible, and if there are metrics or questions we’ve missed, please tell us in the free text boxes! This will maximise the value that you, your team and our members get from the final report.

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* 1. Your details

For each of the following topics, please indicate whether you report on the metric shown, list any other metrics you report on for this area and whether the metric is shared beyond the HR team to your senior leadership to support decision making. 

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* 2. Trainee Recruitment

  Do you report on this metric? Is this metric provided to Senior Leadership?
Cost per hire
Quality of hires (e.g. percentage of candidates who accepted your offer and those who stayed, divided by 2)
Source of hire (Where did they hear about us?)
Which university the applicant attended
Candidate ratings/feedback of the recruitment experience 
Recruiting & Staffing Cost per Hire/Placement
Diversity of Applicants
Diversity of Applicants at assessment days
Diversity of applicants who attended vacation schemes
Diversity of candidates who are offered a training contract
Acceptance/ Conversion rate (number of offered candidates who accept) 

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* 3. Over the next 6 months, are you planning to report on this areas more, less or the same as before Covid-19 and Black Lives Matter?

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* 4. Please name any technology or services you use to support this.

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* 5. Fee earners and Business Support Recruitment

  Do you report on this metric? Is this metric provided to Senior Leadership?
Time to hire
Cost per hire 
Quality of hires (e.g. percentage of candidates who accepted your offer and those who stayed, divided by 2)
Source of hire (e.g. direct sourcing, employee referral vs through agency)
Acceptance/ Conversion rate (number of offered candidates who accept)
Candidate ratings/feedback of the recruitment experience
Recruiting & Staffing Cost per Hire/Placement
Employee referrals as a percent of external hires
Diversity of Applicants through to first stage interview
Diversity of candidates through to second stage interview
Diversity of candidates through to third stage
Diversity of candidates offered
Revenue correlated to hiring diversity metrics
Brand sentiment and reputation related to hiring diversity & inclusion 
Hiring diversity & inclusion trends over time

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* 6. Composition of Existing Employees

  Do you report on this metric? Is this metric provided to Senior Leadership?
Number / Percent of LGBTQ+ employees
Number / Percent of employees identifying with a Disability or physical accessibility need
Number / Percent of employees identifying with a Learning or mental accessibility need
Ethnicity 
Nationality 
Religion 
Gender Identity 
Age
Level of Education
State or fee-paying school (between age 11 and 18) 
Number / Percent of employees who are first generation in their family to attend University
Number / Percent of employees who are carers

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* 7. Pay and Reward

  Do you report on this metric? Is this metric provided to Senior Leadership?
Diversity of those who receive salary increases 
Diversity of those who receive bonuses payments
Length of service of employees who get promoted
Diversity of employees who get promoted (including part time v full time)
Proportion of employees making flexible benefits choices
Performance ratings distribution by grade and function
Performance review ratings compared to previous year
Retention & Engagement

Development refers to enrolment of employees on a specific, structured programme for a finite number of participants. This does not include training that all employees enrol on or self-service training and continuous professional development driven by the employee. 

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* 8. Retention

  Do you report on this metric? Is this metric provided to Senior Leadership?
Overall employee retention (e.g. the current number of employed individuals by the number of employees at the start of your measurement period, multiplied by 100)
Fee earner retention
Business support retention
Retention of employees in minority groups
Retention rate of top performers
Percent of employees receiving retention initiative (e.g. retention bonus, development programmes)
Number / Percent of trainees retained
Retention trends over time 
Revenue correlated to employee diversity
Brand sentiment and reputation related to employee diversity & inclusion 
Uptake of Diversity & Inclusion initatives
Employee Diversity & Inclusion trends over time

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* 9. Engagement

  Do you report on this metric? Is this metric provided to Senior Leadership?
Manager effectiveness
Staff advocacy score (Would you recommend us as an employer?) 
Employee Net Promoter Score (NPS) 
Self-reported engagement scores (e.g. annual engagement / pulse surveys) 
Absenteeism
Employee Health Index
Glassdoor.com ratings
Annual leave days used 
Engagement scores in minority groups
Engagement score trends over time

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* 10. Managing Attrition

  Do you report on this metric? Is this metric provided to Senior Leadership?
Overall employee turnover (e.g. the number of individuals who left over a specific period of time, by the average number of employees over that same period, multiplied by 100)
Fee earner turnover
Business support turnover
Turnover of employees in minority groups
Voluntary turnover / terminations 
Turnover costs (e.g. cost to recruit replacement, cost of onboarding, training costs, cost to achieve productivity) 
Reasons for leaving 
Regrettable vs non-regrettable leavers 
Tenure of leavers 
Number of new hires leaving in first 90 days
Number / Percent of trainees not retained 
Turnover trends over time

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* 11. Wellbeing

  Do you report on this metric? Is this metric provided to Senior Leadership?
Absenteeism 
Bradford Factor 
Absence reasons
Absence occurrences 
Long term sickness 
Number of medical claims 
Mood / Happiness 
Number of Mental Health First Aiders 
Update of Wellbeing training & initatives 
Wellbeing in minority groups 
Uptake of Employee Assistance Programmes 
Wellbeing-related absence trends over time

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* 12. Training & Development 

  Do you report on this metric? Is this metric provided to Senior Leadership?
Time spent on training activities per month / quarter / year
Course sign up rates / Course registration numbers 
Course completion rates (enrolled vs completed) 
Learner drop-off rates 
Time taken to complete courses 
Assessment scores 
Correlation between training and performance 
Correlation between training and promotions 
Recommended courses (Would you recommend?) 
Feedback / Course ratings 
Cost of training 
Return of Investment / Revenue generated per course 
Training uptake in minority groups
Training feedback in minority groups
Training effectiveness trends over time

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* 13. What tools or services are you using for collecting, cleansing, analysing or visualising data?

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* 14. Would you or anyone in your business benefit from support with any of the following? 

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* 15. Are there any other topics or questions you'd like to ask or hear more about? 

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* 16. Veran Performance and MHR might like to understand your views in more detail to help you and your peers to make better use of data, analytics and technology. Are you happy to be contacted for a quick call or virtual coffee? Our privacy policy can be read here.

Thank you for taking the time to complete this survey!

About People in Law, MHR and Veran Performance

People in Law is a network that aims to advance people management across the legal sector. We welcome HR, L&D, Recruitment, D&I, Reward, Senior Partners, Managing Partners and other professionals with an interest in the people agenda.

Our aim is to be a thought leader, offering ideas, insights, best practice and group solution generation. We have invited MHR and Veran Performance to collaborate on this research because both offer services and solutions to law firms which we feel could be valuable to our members.

MHR provide industry-leading UK integrated HR and Payroll systems and HR and Payroll outsourcing services. Our mission is to constantly strive to understand and improve the world of work, people and technology, enabling us to create market-leading platforms and services.

Veran Performance are a specialist HR and Payroll transformation consultancy offering independent, software agnostic advice and support for businesses improve their service, processes, data and technology.
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